When the world ends
by planet p
Summary: A sequel to Condensation, and also set in 1976.


**When the world ends** by planet p

**Disclaimer** I don't own _the Pretender_ or any of its characters.

**Author's Notes** A sequel to _Condensation_, fairly well AU; Rated M.

* * *

_1976_

"BJ!" a girl's voice bellowed across the room, and Emily looked up to see a slim teenage girl, about the same age as Bobby.

"It's just Bobby," Bobby muttered to himself and turned to face the girl, who was currently hurtling across the room toward their location, light brown hair turned to air, and stopped abruptly, out of breath, and laughed and pointed a finger at Bobby.

"You're killing me, BJ! You're really killing me! I'm dying here! See me dead! I can't breathe! What are you doing here? In the real world! Did the mothership assign you a new mission? Get a life?" the girl asked loudly.

Bobby frowned and then laughed, eyes filling with water. "Go on, then! Tell me what you want me to say to that."

The girl made a face. "Fuck you, Bowman!" she scowled. She turned away and stomped off.

Bobby chewed his fingers and glanced at Emily and smiled and stopped chewing his fingers, dropping his hand to his side. "You know what?" he asked, brightly.

Emily stared at him with wide eyes. "What?" she said.

Bobby turned on the spot quickly and grinned. "Forgot!"

"You're weird!" Emily said again.

Bobby stopped smiling. "You know what?" he repeated, and Emily was suddenly frightened, because he sounded different, and he was staring at her. He stepped closer to her.

"What?" Emily asked bravely, pushing the fright and the funny feeling in her tummy away.

Bobby made a face and giggled and quickly put a hand over his mouth, but then took it away again and reached over to touch Emily's face.

Emily took a sharp step backward.

Bobby giggled again and retracted his hand.

Emily was suddenly afraid he was mad, and she wanted to look across the room and catch her mother's eye, or Harmony's – she wanted to be saved – but she didn't trust what Bobby might do when she wasn't looking.

And then, as if Harmony had read her thoughts, she heard Harmony's voice behind her, and then she was sure she could _feel_ Harmony behind her, and she felt a little less scared.

"Emily?" Harmony's voice asked, and Emily barely stopped herself from twirling about and running to her and huddling – safe – in her arms.

This time, Bobby didn't laugh or giggle, but he stepped closer to Emily – who flinched – and placed a hand on her hair, but he wasn't looking at Emily, he was looking at the woman. "Ma'am," he said politely, he tucked his hair behind his arm again, and it fell back in his face again, "folk 'round here don't take so kin'ly to strangers 'round 'ere, don't take kin'ly to strangers gettin' inquis'tive-like none either. 'S why I think i's bes', given the circumstances, that you and you daugh'er leave town. Speedy-like."

Harmony folded her arms across her chest and brushed the boy's hand from Emily's hair, and pulled the little girl to her, eyes fixed on the boy's face. "I think you ought to take your attempts to intimidate someone elsewhere, young man," Harmony told him. "Speedy-like. In fact, I'm going to make it a suggestion."

Bobby laughed in her face. "I'm mad!" he told her, amused, hysterically. "I'm a mad boy! And m-maybe I think your li'l daughter 'ere's real fine, mighty fine, and maybe-maybe you should really go… before I do anything mad-like!"

Harmony set her expression. "Quite the opposite, young man. I think it is you who should go," she told him.

Bobby stared at her. "You threat'nin' me? 'S 'at what you doin', ma'am?" he asked loudly.

Emily pressed herself closer to Harmony, frightened.

"If you're to put me in such an imposition, yes, I may very well be," Harmony replied calmly.

Bobby frowned. "Impo-? Im…?"

"If you are threatening me, young man, then I have no choice to act in kind," Harmony clarified.

Bobby put his hands over his ears.

Harmony reached forward sharply and took one of Bobby's arms and pulled his hand away from his ear, so he could hear what she had to say. "I want you to leave," she told him seriously, "as soon as possible, thank you."

Bobby stared at her, and shook his head.

"Harmony?" Emily heard her mother, Margaret's concerned, but determined voice.

"I believe the young man was just leaving," Harmony replied, and Emily turned and peeked out from under Harmony's arm and saw her mother, who glanced at her frightened eyes quickly, and then to Harmony. When Emily turned back around, her mother was looking at Bobby now too.

Bobby laughed again, and Emily gripped Harmony's arm tighter. The boy was really mad, and he scared her. With that, he spun about and run away across the room, coming to an abrupt halt at the entrance to the lounge, where a man had just entered, and asked the man excitedly if he wanted to see him do a cartwheel.

Emily stared at the pair, glad Bobby had left them alone, but worried that he would do something bad to the man.

Then she heard her mother's voice, low and very serious, "We need to go. As quietly as possible. Now."

Across the room, Emily watched Bobby grab the man's hand and tell him loudly about something he had done at school, or how well he had gone in a test or on an assignment, but Emily didn't hear properly because she had to leave, and then, right before she walked outside, she couldn't hear anything at all that Bobby was saying, she could just see him talking – though he'd let go of the man's hand now, or the man had reclaimed his hand – and instead she could hear a loud conversation between two people at the bar, one of them who stopped talking to look appreciatively at her mother or Harmony.

Emily made a face at the man, and then the door had shut behind them, and she was standing outside on the pavement, and she hurried, with her mother and Harmony, toward the car parked in the parking lot.

But not before the man stepped out of the door marked LOUNGE and saw her mother and her and Harmony.

* * *

Beside the man, Bobby giggled loudly, and the man turned sharply and glanced at Bobby, who put his hands over his face and continued to giggle.

Emily expected her mother to continue walking toward the car – the man wasn't looking (not really, anyway) they could run – but her mother didn't move at all, and stood staring at the man and Bobby.

Then she let go of Emily's hand and started walking toward the man.

Emily became very scared then, and held tighter to Harmony.

As her mother approached the man, the man seemed to realise someone was approaching from behind, and turned to face her mother – who slapped him hard across the face.

Bobby yowled painfully, and her mother said, "That was for Edie and Annie, you bastard!" and Bobby placed himself in between Emily's mother and the man and stared at Emily's mother, who laughed and shot the man a filthy look and the boy a pathetic look before turning swiftly in the dust and walking away.

The man put a hand on his face where Emily's mother had slapped him and looked at Bobby. "Bobby?" he said.

Bobby made a sound in his throat and ran away.

"BOBBY!" the man shouted.

Harmony frowned and glanced at Emily's mother as she marched over.

"What's wrong with William?" she asked.

"William who?" was Emily's mother's forced reply, as she marched by, toward the car.

"Bobby, please come back!" William called after Bobby, who had stopped at the corner, out of breath, to wait for a car to pass.

Bobby turned back. "You can't do anything!" he said, almost too quietly, so Emily and William – who were listening, ears strained – almost didn't hear him. He laughed again, irrationally. "You can't do anything," he repeated.

"What can't I do, Bobby?" William asked loudly. "What can't I do anything about?"

Bobby put his left hand on his face, tears running over his cheek and over his hand. "EVERYTHING!" he screamed.

At that, the girl who'd spoken to Bobby in the lounge earlier, and was walking along the footpath on the other side of the road, raced up the footpath toward the road, and Bobby pelted across the road and grabbed the girl at the corner, put his arms around her tight and held her, and she screamed and tried to kick him, and three cars passed on the road, honking loudly, their occupants whistling and cheering, and Emily heard the girl hiss loudly: "I'm gonna kill you! I'm gonna fucking kill you!"

A black-haired girl around their own age sprinted up to the pair and stopped, breathing hard. "For fuck's sake!" she swore. "Let go of her," she told Bobby, annoyed and dismissive, authority clear in her voice.

Bobby let go of the light brown-haired girl and stepped away from her, and before she could do any more than throw Bobby a dirty look, the dark-haired girl had grabbed her arm and yanked her toward her, forcefully. "Watch where you put your fucking feet!" the dark-haired girl yelled angrily at the other girl. "Eyes, Chel! One day I'm not gonna be there, and you're gonna wind up fucking dead!" She shook the other girl. "Are you hearing me, Chelsea? Do you wanna fucking die?"

"BJ's gonna die!" Chelsea muttered, eyes tearing up, face paling in the face of her friend's words.

The dark-haired girl glanced at Bobby quickly. "Fuck off!" she told him.

He didn't move.

She let go of Chelsea and stepped around her, toward Bobby. "FUCK OFF!" she shrieked. "Fuck off or I'm gon' tell your father you touched me!"

"But he did touch me!" Chelsea protested.

"Not like that, Chel," the other girl told her friend dismissively, glaring determinately at Bobby.

"He touched me, Ivy!" Chelsea said loudly, angered and excited.

Ivy rolled her eyes and moved forward swiftly and pushed Bobby backward. "You not hearin' me, freak! Need me to fuckin' spell it out, retard! I said 'Get lost,' fuckwit!"

"Tell him," Bobby said quietly, stepping away from the fence he had stumbled into when he'd been pushed.

"What?" Ivy yelled.

"I said, 'Tell him.' Tell my father I touched you," Bobby said.

Ivy stared at him for a moment, then she burst into hysterical laughter.

Bobby didn't look away from the girl.

William started to walk to the corner.

Ivy glanced at him quickly, before grabbing Chelsea's arm and pulling her after her, on her way back up the footpath.

Bobby watched them walk away.

By this time, Emily was seated in the back seat of the car, and her mother slammed the door shut, and Emily couldn't hear anything anymore, except the sounds from inside the car, and she wondered if Chelsea was mad too, like Bobby.

Her mother turned the key in the ignition, hands shaking – and nothing happened.

She turned the key again, and again nothing happened. She swore, and swore again, for swearing in front of her young daughter and Harmony.

She got out of the car and slammed the door after her, making it clear that no one else was to leave the car.

* * *

Emily leant over and wound the window down, glancing worriedly at her mother, walking toward William.

"What did you do to the car?" she yelled.

William spun about, and frowned. "What car?" he asked.

"My car!" Emily's mother shouted.

"I need a drink," William muttered to himself, and walked past Emily's mother, toward his own car, a shiny new black Mercedes-Benz with Delaware number plates.

Emily's mother turned back to the car, but didn't look at Emily, and instead stared after William. "Good!" she yelled.

William did not reply but came back a couple of moments later and walked into the hotel.

"It's not bust," Bobby said from behind Emily's mother, who spun about, and glared at the boy, who continued to explain some of the problems commonly associated with the model car she was driving.

Emily glared at him.

Emily's mother said, "If you ever harm my family, I'll hunt you down and pay you back, eye for and eye, blood spilt for blood spilt! Do we have an understanding?" Bobby didn't say anything, which Emily's mother took as affirmation. "Help me start the car," she said, and marched away.

Emily ducked quickly, and furiously wound the window back up – and almost squashed Bobby's hand. "Do you have sweets?" he asked.

Emily's mother came around from the front of the car, where she'd lifted the bonnet, and planted a hand on her hip. "Why do you need a sweet?" she asked roughly.

"I'm diabetic," Bobby told her plainly, still watching Emily.

Emily's mother walked over and yanked Bobby's hand away from the glass – so that Emily could finish winding the window up. "You don't talk to my daughter, do you understand?" she said.

Bobby said nothing.

"Say something," Emily's mother told him. She slapped him.

He didn't even blink.

"Open your mouth!" Emily's mother barked.

"I understand," Bobby said, voice plain.

"We don't have sweets," she told him. "You'll have to go without, the same as the rest of us." She marched away, back to the engine.

Bobby followed her.

* * *

"How old are you?" Margaret asked, watching Bobby looking for a tool in the boot and reached across to grab it and pass it to him at the same time he spotted it and reached for it also.

"Sixteen," Bobby replied, passing Margaret the tool. "Turn away," he told her.

Margaret glared and didn't turn around, but reached over to pull Bobby's arm away from the toolbox and pull him away from it.

"I'm epileptic," he said. "Turn away."

Margaret laughed, and watched him collapse in front of her. She put her hand over her mouth.

* * *

"I'm only going to say this once," Margaret told him, as he stood up and leant against the open boot. "I'm so sorry."

Bobby laughed. "Yeah," he said. "Save it for Jarod and Kyle."

Margaret threw the tool at him before she hit him with it and hit him and hit him again.

Bobby put his arms around her and held her fast, like his mother had been taught to hold him because of his autism. "Don't struggle," he told her. "You can't do anything now. You can't get out of this. Breathe, and calm down. Calm down and I'll let you go. Breathe. Struggle and you'll hurt yourself. Just breathe."

Margaret finally calmed down, and, true to his word, Bobby released her. "I'm sorry," he said, plainly.

Margaret spun around and backed him up against the back of the car. "Scratch that!" she told him viciously. "Just you try that again, you little fucker! Just you fucking try! I dare you!"

"One day, the world will be older," Bobby told her. "One day, we'll be older. And one day, the world will end. So you see, none of this matters at all." He smiled. "When the world ends, maybe something else will start." He grabbed a tool from the toolbox and walked away. "Or maybe it won't."

Margaret picked up another tool and walked after him, and seeing the bruise darkening on his cheek bone, smiled.

"Just in case," Bobby said, adjusting something on the engine, "keep your daughter the Hell away from me." He turned away from the engine. "That should have done it," he said. "Try it again."

Margaret scowled and slammed the bonnet down.

"We're Chosen," Bobby told her, and placed the tool down on the bonnet and walked away.

Margaret returned the tools to the boot and slammed the boot shut before walking around to the front of the car and getting in and trying the key in the ignition.

The engine started.

She glanced at the jelly babies in Harmony's hand.

"The boy gave them to me. I didn't want to say 'no'. I thought it would sound rude."

Margaret refrained from saying anything and snatched a couple of jelly babies and passed them to Emily on the backseat.

Emily squealed excitedly.

Margaret ignored the painful sound. "Next time," she told Harmony, "you say 'no'. We don't accept charity."

She took one of the jelly babies and backed the car out of the parking space and out of the parking lot onto the road.

"From scum!" she growled in a low voice.


End file.
